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But Leslie H. Wexner went ahead and launched the lingerie chain anyway, and today, Victoria’s
Secret is one of the flagship companies at Wexner’s L Brands, with 2012 sales of $6.6 billion.

The anecdote was one of many that Wexner told as the inaugural speaker of “CEO Insights,” an
event series aimed at small-business CEOs that the Columbus Chamber launched yesterday at the
Hilton Columbus Downtown.

Wexner said he spent “probably two years” traveling to various cities he considered romantic in
Europe, such as Paris and Milan, trying to find a lingerie shop similar to the idea he had for
Victoria’s Secret.

The launch, he admitted, was the most challenging of any in a career that began

50 years ago with one store — The Limited.

The reason why there were naysayers about Victoria’s Secret might have been because of how
people thought of the lingerie category

30 years ago, when the chain was preparing to launch, said Deborah Mitchell, professor of
marketing at Ohio State University’s Fisher College of Business.

“Back then, most people thought of that category in functional terms,” Mitchell said. “Whereas,
from the beginning, Les Wexner thought it was not just about function, it was about the
psychological and emotional benefits of the lingerie, being able to project to yourself this fun
and sexy image.

“He really brought the category to a totally different place.”

Wexner also told the crowd of small-business leaders that, in many launches in his career,
including Victoria’s Secret, he felt considerable fear. That was particularly the case when he
opened his first store in 1963.

“My nightmare was that I would go broke,” he said. “Quite honestly, I was very motivated by the
fear of failure. I felt like a bear was chasing me, and if I stopped, the bear was going to eat
me."

So driven was he that he worked every waking moment at the store and thought of nothing else. “I
have virtually no remembrance of anything that happened outside,” he said of those first few
years.

But, Wexner said, the fear he has felt over the years has never stopped him from moving
forward.

“You have to have sensible fear of failure, but you can’t be paralyzed by it,” he said.

The Limited experience did create a lifelong habit, he said, that applied well when he began to
focus on launching Victoria’s Secret as a chain. While nothing about The Limited was “terribly
inventive,” he said, “to everything in that store I applied the idea, ‘How do I do it better?’ ”&
amp; amp; amp; lt; /p>

Staying relevant, Wexner said, isn’t easy in the fashion business. “You’re not going to be a
1.000 hitter all the time. You’re going to be more wrong than right. You just have to correct your
errors as quickly, as economically, as possible.”

If Wexner has endured a few wrong moves in his career, one decision that has turned out well has
been the one to stay in his hometown, he said.

“I think Columbus has the potential to be one of the great cities of the world,” Wexner said. “
This is a pretty damned nice place. We don’t have mountains and we don’t have oceans, but we are in
the middle. We’re in a great place.”

tferan@dispatch.com

More from Les Wexner

As the inaugural speaker for the Columbus Chamber’s new “CEO Insights” series, Leslie H. Wexner
offered numerous observations about life’s lessons, including the following:

• On the advice that real-estate developer John W. Galbreath gave him: “He told me, ‘Just pursue
things that interest you with an open mind.’ I was really looking for a working diagram of success.
But what he was really talking about was open-mindedness, to be curious. You don’t have to know
what the next thing is.”

• On doing business the right way: “If a customer brought something back, I would give them a
refund, I’d give them money back (not a coupon), because that seemed fair. My dad said, ‘Are you
crazy? You can’t afford that.’ I didn’t know I was right. The proof that it was right was when
someone came back.”

• On advice that Banc One banker John G. McCoy gave him as a young man: “I thought he was going
to call in the loan. ... I was on the verge of passing out, but he said, ‘I know you’ve been
working very hard. But I think you should think about tithing, financially and in time.’ ”

• On the way to treat people: “I remember my dad and I were in a Woolworth’s, and someone was
giving a waitress a hard time. After this person left, my dad said, ‘That wasn’t right. The
waitress was in a vulnerable position. If you pick on somebody, always pick on someone your own
size.’ ”

• On an offer by John Glenn to help him become the other senator from Ohio and “get things done
for the state”: “I thought about it, and I said, ‘No, I like what I’m doing.’ ”

• On encouraging diversity: “I grew up on the wrong side of the tracks. I kind of grew up with a
chip on my shoulder, and didn’t think the world was fair. It’s hard to level the playing
field."